Steamboat Signature Cocktail: Low’s Tennessee Three

Known for its Southern cooking and atmosphere, Low’s Country Kitchen whips up a mean fried chicken, but what about its Southern cocktails? Cocktail curator Rena Day provides an inside look at how to make one of the restaurant's most popular (and delicious) concoctions.

What makes the Tennessee Three unique, says Day, is local honey from Outlaw Apiaries.

“It tastes like a honey-lavender lemonade,” said Day, who has tended bars for some 16 years. “I love digging up old recipes. I’m into nostalgia and how our cocktails came to be.”

Cocktails should be creative and involve juices, sauces and perhaps infused oils, she said. “You need to think outside the box,” she said, highlighting such ingredients as infused red bell pepper juice. “I want people to be wowed when their drink arrives."

Add spirit of choice (for this recipe, Day used Old Forester Bourbon). Add fresh lemon juice, honey water (half honey/half hot water) and lavender simple syrup (hint: make it like tea by adding three tablespoons of lavender to hot water and sugar, letting it sit over night and then straining). Next, add ice, pour into shaker and shake. Strain over ice, adding soda water and lemon for garnish.